


Try, Try again.

by myrskytuuli



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-22 23:18:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15592977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrskytuuli/pseuds/myrskytuuli
Summary: Rey, the desert child with no parents, strong in the force, carried with her the memories of a past life of Anakin Skywalker, of Darth Vader. It turns out that the force would not let the chosen one go as easy as that.Or, Reynakin's not good, very bad day when the First Order drops on her planet and it turns out that her grandson is delusional mess.





	Try, Try again.

She cannot fix on the moment she knew, just that she has always been vaguely aware, and that it never came to her all in one epiphany. She has always been Rey. She has always been Anakin. Did it make sense? No. Did most things concerning her and the force make sense? Also no.

So that is who she is. The child in a desert. Parentless, strong in the force.

She still hates the kriffing sand.

During many desert storm and long cold desert nights she had contemplated her existence, her purpose, her meaning. Eventually she had come to the conclusion that this was the universe’s way of punishing her for all of the deeds that she had committed as Darth Vader.

Being surrounded by sand. All that sand. Sand in her hair, in her eyes, in her mouth. In her nose, when she tries to breathe, and in her vagina when she tries to pee.

As far as Rey is concerned, it is very effective. The Jedi might have had their own legends of Sith hell, filled with all kinds of levels of pure darkness and monsters and madness, but the quiet indifference of a desert seemed much more fitting justice for a reborn Sith-lord.

So, she lived, grew up, brushed the sand from her everything, and existed quietly. Surviving a childhood alone on an outlawed desert planed was not easy, but it was easier this time around.

In her early childhood her memories would still mix up and get tangled and she might wake up calling out for her mother, trying to catch the familiar scent of Shmi’s oiled hair in her little hovel, before realising that she had never known a Shmi, that she was alone, that there was her life and the dream-life.

Then she grew up, and her mind sorted itself out, aging her soul past middle-age in her teens, bringing with it the realisation that the force would not let its child go that easily.

By the age that she first started menstruating, she had already resolved to live a quiet life of penance in anonymity, scavenging the deserts of Jakku, ripping apart the old bones of the Empire’s leftovers, feeling not much, and making sure that her reborn presence would in no way affect the galaxy.

It was a solid plan, and like most plans made by Anakin Skywalker, it too was doomed to fail from the start.

 

It is the sound of a droid in distress that starts the familiar vortex of getting sucked into action outside of your control. Of course, it is a droid. There has always been a special place in her heart for droids, had even had the dubious sympathy of Darth Vader once upon a time.

The droid also sounds so very much like less foul-mouthed version of R2-D2, that how could she not spring on her feet and race across the sand dunes to defend the little ball of anxious beebing, staff gripped tight and teeth bared in righteous fury.

“Hey! You leave them alone, you worthless piece of tauntaun spit! Don’t even think about laying a finger on even their antennae!”

The older scavenger looks at her mostly in confusion, and then ignores her completely.

The urge to force-choke comes like an old reflex, and she stamps it out with vengeance. She is trying to live out her penance. Even the pitiful beebs from an overly adorable round ball are not enough to make her forget about her penance.

It is a close call though. The droid is almost illegally adorable. Apparently somewhere between the death of Darth Vader and this day, someone had been tasked with designing droids to look cuddlier.

Teedo looks at her, and she looks at Teedo, and maybe there is just enough Darth Vader left in her that the primal part of Teedo’s brain recognises the danger, and he turns around, leaving the young woman and the valuable droid be.

“Are you okay?”

The droid beebs back, chattering away happily in binary, introducing themselves as BB-8.

“No. You can’t stay with me. I can point you towards the nearest out-post, but _that’s it_.”

BB-8 makes a heart-breaking sequence of sad beebs.

“No, you don’t understand…I- I can’t get involved. In anything. I have to stay here, out of the way. Where I’m safe. I have to make my penance.”

Beeb beeb beb beeb.

“Never you mind for what. It is just how it is.”

Beb beeb beeeb beb

“Fine, but only for tonight!”

  

BB-8 settles into the least sandy nook of her small home that she has carved into the belly of a fallen walker. Digging a small canister of oil from a nook inside the panels, she finally settles cross-legged in front of the droid.

“Where did you come from?” BB-8 cannot be native. They would have been gutted and sold for scraps years ago.

_“Classified”_

Rey keeps rubbing the oil into the poor droid’s sand infested body, but bites her lip. This sounds alarmingly like she is in danger of being dragged into something that will force her to get _involved._

“I see. Well, we all have our secrets. I won’t ask, if you won’t.”

The droid rolls their head to peer closer at Rey, who keeps rubbing the oil and tries to not be bothered.

“ _I need to find my friend.”_ The droid finally offers, their binary sounding worried.

“And where did you last see your friend?”

BB-8 goes quiet for a while, and Rey knows, _knows_ with the memories of lifetime of war that the answer will not be something simple that could be easily solved with a pointed finger to the nearest settlement.

“ _We were in a ship. It was attacked by the First Order.”_

Rey curses under her breath. She won’t let it happen again. She won’t get pulled in.

 

“60 portions.”

“No.”

“That droid is-“

“ _No._ I will not sell sentient beings like things.”

 

She walks through the markets, cursing the sand quietly under her breath, when the force taps politely on her mind, and her lips are instantly pulled into a annoyed frown. Her nomadic penance has by no means been a nonviolent one, as there is no way to live nonviolent life on the scrapyards of Jakku.

The first thug does not get close enough to touch, before he is taken down by a brutal blow to his stomach with the end of her staff. The second thug gets as far as touching her shoulder, before he too is carelessly disarmed and left to whimper on the ground, cradling his broken arm.

Those merchants who know the girl from the desert ignore the whole incident. If anyone has any theories on how a little girl living alone on the outskirts of civilization and with no friends nor mentors could have learned to fight like the best trained weapon in the galaxy, they keep their own council.

BB8, the target of this very ill-advised droidnapping barely acknowledges the tussle. They are too busy already rolling franticly away, beebing as they go.

“Wait!”  Rey yells, and wonders if it is proper to feel this annoyed by having to babysit a reckless droid during her penance. She has been trying her best to stay away from the temptations of the dark side, but maybe she is being tested.

The little adorable ball of wires and bolts is relentlessly trying to beat up a fully grown human male. The effort is admirable, because the droid does not have hands nor sharp corners, but still seems to be winning the match. The human is a moderately attractive man with dark skin and general disposition of someone who has taken more showers in the last week than the entire population of Jakku has in last year.

 _Thief!!_ Beebs BB8, who rolls back few meters. The man looks relieved until he realises that the droid was not backing away, but gathering speed. They roll full speed right at his legs, toppling the man down with an undignified screech.

Rey decides to intervene, as finding a tussle between a man and a droid this funny is probably a pathway to the dark side.

She twirls her staff, until the end of it is pointing at the man’s forehead. The man looks like he is slowly trying to sink his way into the sand in his effort to create distance between himself and the staff.

“They say that you stole that jacket from their friend.” Rey says, nodding at the angry droid.

The man’s eyes are easy to read, and he doesn’t even need to say anything before Rey knows that BB8 will not be seeing their friend again. The dimmening of those eyes is genuine, as is the pain.

BB8 still holds onto hope all the way till the words “He didn’t make it” are finally said out loud. Rey wishes there was something she could say to the droid that wails in quiet grief, but if there is something she knows it is that there is nothing that can be said in the face of grief.

She is an expert on grief.

But for Rey, this meeting is a very fortunate one, as now that BB8 has been reunited with their fellow resistance fighter, it means that Rey no longer has any reason to be involved.

“So, you are with the resistance?”

The man stumbles through an answer, managing to turn a simple ‘yes’ into several sentences long nervous stream of consciousness. Rey isn’t surprised; What she remembers of the rebellion, it had been manned either by suave spies or socially incompetent weirdoes. Those were the two types attracted to rebellions.

“Good. Because BB8 is apparently in some kind of a secret mission and could really use the help of another resistance member.” Already she feels glad that the issue has resolved itself this neatly. No reason for her to get involved, or know more, or jeopardize her penance in any way. It is right now what is most important, and there is no reason that could ever pry her away from this desert.

“-apparently that droid has a map that leads to Luke Skywalker and everyone’s after it.”

_Luke?_

Well kriff.

“Luke? Luke Skywalker?” She repeats, half fearing and half hoping that she heard wrong.

“Yes. The legendary Jedi master.”

The earth moves from under her feet, and there is a thrumming sound in her ears. She-

No. Wait, that is not her, that is the explosion.

The familiar sound of a peaceful marketplace turning into a war-zone in a matter of seconds locked her senses to an adrenaline-fuelled, crystal-clear battle mode, and threw her mind straight back to the clone wars.  

The moderately attractive resistance fighter immediately grasped her hand, showing her that whatever he was, he was not a seasoned soldier.

They zig-zag through the flaming wastes, and she uses the force to guide them through a safe route, dragging the resistance fighter behind her, who is surprisingly amiable to being led. BB8 rolls behind them and from the corner of her eye, she sees something that is clearly a sign from the universe that it is playing a huge joke on her.

Maybe this is the universe’s way to test her resolve, to see if she will again fall to the illusion that she can fix anything, that she can protect anything, or maybe just if the temptation to ride that infamously fast ship is enough to tempt her away from her penance.

The universe is not playing fair, as the Millennium Falcon happens to be the only functioning ship on the area, and therefore there isn’t really any choice in the matter, she simply has to drive the ship that Darth Vader definitely had never been jealous off and had never secretly wished to take on a spin.

“Do you even know how to pilot a ship?” Asks the resistance fighter, as Rey flings herself on the pilot’s seat, taking their escape very seriously and not feeling at all giddy. The man is given a stare that had once made the Empire’s rank and file piss themselves. It is not nearly as effective without the mask.

The ships lifts off, slams straight back into the sand, takes off again, flounders, does some unnecessary loops, almost crashes again, stabilises for two seconds, and flounders again like a drunk pigeon. This is not because Rey’s piloting skills are rusty, but because Han Solo is not only annoying, pain in the ass smartmouth, but also a complete lunatic when it comes to ship modifications. Millennium Falcon is apparently a ship that is protected against theft by control deck that makes no sense to anyone expect those with severe brain trauma and Han Solo. 

“You sure that you know how to pilot?” comes the doubtful voice of her new companion from her earpiece, and she grits her teeth. Could the first human to ever win the Boonta Eve pilot?

“Just focus on the defence!”

From there on, it is pure force enhanced reflex. Flipping, spinning, loosing the tailgaters, and it makes her blood sing with familiarity and simplicity. The closest thing to a true freedom they had ever felt, all of them; Anakin and Vader and now even Rey.

“You drive like a maniac!” Comments the man in her ear, and Rey can almost hear the soft laughter of Obi-wan in the back of her mind.

“I’ll spin this thing around, you shoot that last fly off the sky!”

“That’s quite a trick, you sure you can pull this off?!”

“ Of course I can. It’s my best trick,” she grins and a long-forgotten feeling settles on her chest, of having companions, having someone to banter with, to defend your back. She blames the feeling on gravity, as she flips the ship around and the g-forces take hold.

 

If they think that getting into deep space meant smooth riding for the rest of the trip, they are wrong. They barely have time to exchange names, before the ship starts to fall apart underneath them, years of neglect showing itself in faulty pipes and rusty systems. She’s fully submerged inside the ship, wrench in both hands and one in her mouth, as Finn anxiously peers down, holding even more wrenches on his hands ready to give them to her if needed. She mumbles curses in several different languages into the wrench, trying to make sense of Han Solo’s artistic vision for an exhaust system.

“G’v’m’t’h-“ She spits the wrench out, “Give me the- no, not that one the- Yes that. If you two are to get back to your base this ship’s exhaust system needs to be patched and fast.”

Finn gives her the tool, looking confusedly at Rey. “We. Aren’t you coming with us?”

“What no- I, no.” She can’t. “I have to go back to Jakku.”

“WHY does everyone want to go back to Jakku!?”

Because it is where I am supposed to be. Where the force put me. To pay my penance, she thinks, and doesn’t say: Because if I give in to temptation and try to change things, control things, I will fall to the dark side, become the new Darth Vader again, because I’m dangerous. If you know who you were really talking to, you would run away screaming.

“Because I have to.”

“What- No You don’t. What do you have there? Family, boyfriend-?”

“I just have to!” Even Finn senses the sudden heaviness in the room, and draws back, instinct recognising danger. He looks confused of his own reaction, but it is all the confirmation that Rey needs for her decision. She was tempted as she heard the name of her son (former son) but she is over it now. This was how it started the first time too.

As if summoned by her dark thoughts, a shadow appears over them, looming like a predator and pulling them slowly but surely in. A freighter that has locked them into tractor-beam. Any hopes of returning back to Jakku without complications is shattered by the ship that swallows them inside its unforgiving jaws.

“It’s the first order.” States Finn, who has stamped down his emotions and fear with practice that Rey would have expected only from the Jedi of old, conditioned from early childhood; not from civilian-turned rebel, which he clearly is with his lack of combat experience.

But she might have to rework her earlier assumption, because he clearly knows the First Order, is familiar with their practices, and not from the perspective of a civilian that never gets to see inside the military machine.

“The poison gas! Stormtrooper helmets don’t filter out toxins, so if we unfix the leak-!”

They work in sync, fitting together incredibly well, already becoming not just acquaintances, but partners.

 

When the heavy footsteps stop over their hiding base, the last face she would have expected to see peering down at them was Han Solo’s. And still, despite all the odds and common sense, there he is. The man who had somehow gotten Leia to say the words “I love you” to him, despite there being no basis whatsoever for someone as incredible as Leia to even waste one breath to someone as worthless as Han Solo.

Her first instinct is that she wants to punch him in the face. She can’t reach from down here, so she ends up yelling “HAN SOLO” at that elderly face, that lifts one curious eyebrow at the angry tone, but no more. This is a man who has entirely grown numb to complete strangers yelling his name angrily at him.

Chewbacca just looks at Han disappointedly. This is a wookie who has grown entirely numb to complete strangers yelling Han Solo’s name at said man angrily.

“Wait, Han Solo?” asks Finn beside her.

“How do you know my name?”

“The war hero? The legendary general?”

No. Rey wants to say. The only legendary he is, is legendarily-not-good-enough-for-Leia and a legendary pain-in-the-ass.

“A smuggler.” Rey ends up saying, giving out the only title this man has ever earned in her eyes.

“And who the hell are you two?”

“We’re-“

“Nobodies.”

“She stole this ship from the Niima outpost, because we were being chased by the First Order and-“

“It was in the market of stolen goods.”

“You flew this away from the First Order? Just the two of you?”

“Sure, she’s a great pilot! Flew this thing without a co-pilot even. You should have seen her-“

“That’s impossible.” States Han Solo who peers at the two of them, like he is just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Rey pulls herself under control, reminds herself of her penance, and refuses to be baited by Han Solo. She is not going to fall to the dark side for _Han Solo_.

Instead she climbs up from the pit and ignores the way Finn is basically fanboying over the man. Whatever. She’s not jealous.

“Right. I’m going to drop you two bozos off at the nearest inhabited planet and-“

“Wait!” Finn yells. “You can’t! We have to find the resistance base. This droid needs to get there, it has important information about the whereabouts of Luke Skywalker-“

The name hits Rey once again, and apparently has a similar effect to Han. She had secretly wished that he wouldn’t react, but despite everything it seems that despite all his other faults, (and there are many), he is still a true friend.

“they do need to get to the base.” She adds quietly. “For Luke.”

Han gives her a queer look, full of suspicion, but has no time to question her further as a booming sound alerts them all to the fact that it has not actually been just Rey and Finn on that ship.

 

Any goodwill Rey might have started to feel for Solo disappears when she finds out that the man has been smuggling kriffing _Rathtars_ in his ship!

 

Crouching underneath the floor, Finn taps anxiously at his tights. “Do you think he is going to talk his way out of it?”

“No.” Says Rey with conviction of a person who remembers a security recording of a “ _Fine, we’re all fine down here, how- how are you_?”

“We have to help him!” Finn hisses at her, as they hear the muffled sounds of Solo not talking himself out of the confrontation between two rival gangs, both wanting his head.

“Maybe we can get rid of the criminals and slip away”, she ponders, a plan already forming in her head. “C’mon.”

Finn follows.

 

“That was your plan!” Finn hisses loudly, which still has no change of being heard over the sound of three rampaging rathtars.

“I know. Clever isn’t it? The beasts will take care of the criminals and we can slip away.”

“HAN SOLO IS THERE TOO! He is going to die too! What were you thinking!”

“Han Solo will be fine. That man is unkillable.”

“What- How-“

“Don’t you know how long Darth Vader kept trying.”

Finn makes a noise that almost manages to sound Shyriwookian and drags Rey along with him. “We will help him, we have to”.

They push out from underneath the floorboards and start running. This time it is Finn leading them, Rey keeping hold of his hand as he navigates the hallways of the military vessel with ease, up until a tentacle appears from behind a corridor and yanks him by the ankle.

“FINN!!” She screams, watching as her new (only) friend is dragged by the tentacled abomination towards the foul mouth and several rows of razor sharp teeth, like a smaller, travel sized version of a sarlac-pit.

All of her senses narrow down to only her and Finn and the monster, to this one moment, and the force sings in her veins. A dark force.

Her spine goes rigid, her feet are planted to the ground heavy, and she looks at the monster, a monster that shudders, then shudders again. It’s tentacles thrash wildly, but hazardly, as all five airways that the creature have are suddenly being crushed under an invisible grip. It makes a gurgling sound as she raises her hand, all of her emotions singing only one litany in her mind _don’t touch him don’t touch him don’t touch him-_

The rathtar loosens its grip on Finn enough for him to slip loose, and to scramble forwards in panic, only getting his feet underneath him after few feet of fast crawling.

Rey can feel the gold just dancing underneath her irises, can taste power that would suffocate the creature for good, only a small push of force and she could crush its miserable airways forever-

“REY!”

She looks away from the beast, to the wild eyes of Finn, who is staring at his friend and not understanding what he is seeing. “What are you still standing there for!” He yells, grabs Rey by the biceps, and hauls her with him.

Then they are once again running, hearing the pained howls of the disoriented beast behind them, and Rey feels sick. It is only the grounding hold that Finn has on her arm that keeps her running, instead of dropping to her knees and throwing up then and there. She can still smell the rotten phantom-scent of the dark side in her nostrils.

The next thing she knows, they are at the Falcon. Han Solo is yelling something at her, but she cannot understand. There is a wailing sound like an injured wookie coming from somewhere, but she doesn’t know where. There is more shouting and loud noises and somewhere something explodes. She is ushered into the ship by someone.

As the door of the Falcon closes behind her, something snaps back inside her, like an elastic band.

This is unacceptable behaviour. He has a duty, and emotional faults are not acceptable. He is a weapon, a knight, an enforcer. He assesses the situation and takes the co-pilot’s seat. The older man protests at first but relents as he too assesses the situation. There is an object in front of them, a creature known as rathtar, creating an obstacle to their successful departure. The older man states that they will jump to light-speed, he follows the procedure as a co-pilot, so that they might do so. The obstacle disintegrates in front of them with the force of the jump and the stars turn into slits as they make the jump. He feels nothing.

 

“Rey! Rey! REY!”

She turns her head, and sees Finn’s worried face just inches from her own. He looks scared. She is sitting on the co-pilot’s seat and from the window she can see the impressions of lines created by light speed. She remembers the jump, but through a haze. She breathes out, and it feels like the first real breath she has taken in a long time.

“I’m okay.”

“Rey, you scared me.” Finn’s hand is on her shoulder. “You were just staring into nothingness. You were just-.”

“There now.” Comes the voice of Han Solo from the other side of her. “Give the kid some space. She was just in shock.”

“I wasn’t-“ She starts, and then doesn’t continue. Instead she slumps against the seat and puts an arm over her eyes, leaning her head back. She feels like her mental age.

“We are all fine now.” Solo continues, and Rey can’t help the burst of entirely inappropriate laughter that escapes from her. It seems however to be the right thing to do, as the others soon follow, even Chewbacca’s faint laughter sounding from the back.

 

They barely have time to settle down, before the warnings start to flash in the cockpit, the ship still suffering from all the abuses that beings trying to bypass Solo’s modifications have unwittingly wrecked on the ship. They start a mad scramble to race ahead of these faults before they turn the ship into nothing more than a wreck.

Solo lifts one unwillingly impressed eyebrow as Rey waves the ripped-out compressor in her hands.

“I bypassed it.”

She feels weirdly validated by that ‘hmm well’, look, and tries not to. The look is too reminiscent of Obi-Wan however for her to entirely do that. Then she remembers that this is Han Solo, and angrily turns away. It does not go unnoticed by Solo, who frowns.

 

The ship humms with the steady glide of travel, and there is an exhausted peace hanging over all of them. Chewbacca is dozing off against the wall, nursing his wounds. Finn has slumped near him, dozing against a hairy shoulder. For all the fuzz and noise he made during the ride claiming that said wookie was trying to maul him to death, one would think that he would steer clear of him, but whatever went down with the two seems to have been put to past. There is a gigantic hand slightly holding onto Finn’s shoulder, almost protectively.

A smile tugs at Rey’s lips, even if her head is starting to pound with the low that has followed the adrenaline-high. (and dark-side high)

Solo strides besides her, and snorts at the pair. She can hear the fond “softie” breathed quietly by the man, as he makes a hand gesture asking Rey to follow.

Rey doesn’t. She doesn’t want to talk with Solo, doesn’t want to be reminded of Vader, of the Empire and the Rebellion, not about any of it. But Solo is insistent, and curls his hand half-way around her bicep. If he had grabbed, Rey would have shaken him off, but he doesn’t. He has his hand hovering around her arm, and the polite suggestion forces her to follow Solo in a way that physical force wouldn’t.

“Have we met before?” Asks Solo as they are standing in a cramped corridor.

“No.”

“Then whatever you have heard about me is not true.”

Rey sneers.

“Look, kid.” Solo runs a hand through his hair, looking frustrated. “You don’t like me, that’s fine. Lot of folks don’t. But I would at least like to know why?”

Of course, she shouldn’t say anything. Or say something, but lie. But a partial truth slips out instead, as she is not used to talking to anyone but herself for a long time.

“You worked for The Hutt.”

Han’s eyes grow sharp, looking at Rey. She knows that she has made a mistake.

“The Hutt? Jabba? Only Luke used to-“ He pauses, looks again. “How did you end up in Jakku?”

“I’ve always been in Jakku.”

Then Han speaks “----- ----  ----   ---  -- ----------” And Rey grabs at the front of his shirt, pushing him against the wall. “Who taught you that!!”

“A friend. He was born in Tatooine. His father was one of the people.”

“ _He_ taught you the _tongue of the people_?!”

“Just few phrases.”

Rey hisses.

“Kid. You don’t need to tell me about your past, or yourself or anything, but I _never_ smuggled people. Never.”

There is _something_ sliming inside her belly, something old, something that has been there for so long that you don’t feel it anymore, something that your body has grown around. Luke has taught Solo _the tongue_. A smuggler who brought spices to The Hutt’s table, one of the many small nuts and bolts working to keep The Hutt’s palace opulent. Han Solo, who had been freedom incarnate, flying through the galaxy untethered by anything or anyone, going careless as he pleases, taking orders from no one, _free, free, free-_

She bangs a weak fist against his chest and then does it again. There is something weird happening to her eyes, and she realises that she is leaking.

“Kid.” Solo says, and there are hands on her shoulders, even as she takes one last pathetic swing at his chest. “I’m not proud of it. There are lot of things I’m not proud. It wasn’t really until I met Luke that- But nevermind you that. If it makes you feel any better, I got what was coming when Vader froze me and sold me to Jabba for wall-decoration.”

It did the opposite of making her feel better. It made her feel like the thing in her belly, that her body had grown around, was finally bursting apart and ripping her innards on the way out. There was a shudder as it happened, and to her shame it was now Solo that was keeping her upright.

“He was a monster.”

“Yeah well. I won’t argue with that.”

“Vader sold a person to The Hutt.” Her hands fisted on his shirt again, shaking him like she was trying to convince Han of the fact. “Vader didn’t have to do that. His master didn’t order it. He just chose to.”

Han, who had clearly lost the thread of the conversation was content to just let the hysterical girl ride it out, whatever it was.

She shudders against Solo again, her body out of her control, a sensation that only helped to heighten the panic that was already building through her veins, and in a diabolical loop making self-control even more of an impossibility. Two life-times of repression fighting against the hormonal biology of a teenage-girl, and the hormones were winning, easily.

So, she took long gulping breaths, on the brink of drowning from her own tears. Finally, her legs betray her and she ends up sliding down, taking Solo down with her, who goes down easy and loops his arms around Rey, slipping into the role of a parent with torturous ease.

The hand settling on the back of her head brings back memories that can be classified as historical relics, so far back in her personal history they are buried. Memories of a mother comforting her crying child, of a gentle touch and hush-hush noises. The only person in the personal history of Anakin-Vader-Rey to ever hold and comfort them.

There were no defences at this point, the body and the weakness and the emotions (dark side…?) had won, and there was nothing else to it but to surrender and cry in the embrace of Han Solo.

Eventually the tears stopped, and Han Solo was left to contemplate an unconscious teenager on his arms.

 

Rey wakes up in a reasonably comfortable, if well-worn, bed. The memories of last night crash into her consciousness like a jackhammer, making her immediately wish that she had stayed sleeping. Or dead.

A polite but insistent knocking on the door continues unrelenting until she gets up with sheer anger and opens the door snarling. On the other side Finn smiles at her so blindingly that the snarl drops right off of her face.

“Hey!”

Rey blinks and then nods. Finn looks fresh and recently showered, which makes Rey take a note of her own clothes, still the same that she had crawled in vents and ran through exploding sands of Jakku.

“Captain Solo told to come wake you up. He’s made breakfast.”

“Right. Um. I’ll be right there.” She says, slams the door on Finn’s face, and feels guilty about it, but not guilty enough to open the door again. She feels tired, even if she also feels better rested than she can remember feeling ever since, well ever since the start of the clone wars.

Indulging in a sonic shower she ponders whether to accept the clothes that Solo has left folded on a chair next to the bed. They are clean, and rolling the sleeves and pants would probably make them almost fit, but she leaves them untouched. Her own aren’t yet that tattered and the smell isn’t going to kill anyone yet.

Finding the kitchen area turns out to be easy as she just follows the noises, and in a ship this small there are only so many wrong turns you can make.

In the kitchen, Han Solo is flipping something on a frying pan over the stove, while Finn and Chewbacca inhale their food at the small fold-out table.

“Well finally. I thought you had started hibernating.” Solo hollers and slides a plate full of half-burnt something on the table, clearly meaning for Rey to sit down.

She does, and avoids eye-contact with the smuggler.

“But then again, we were up late last night making repairs on the ship, so fair is fair.”

Rey glances at Solo’s direction and sees nothing but nonchalance in him. Finn and Chewbacca don’t even blink at the man’s remark.

So, Rey settles down and pokes the food with her fork, finally putting some in her mouth. It tastes like edible food, which is more than can be said of the most things that Rey has fed herself during these last 19 years.

“Is it true then.” Asks Finn, looking at Han and trying to look nonchalant but failing.

“Is what true?”

“Luke Skywalker. He’s really…Real?”

“He’s real all-right, kid.”

Rey’s food has been forgotten. There are now other things demanding attention.  

“Then what happened to him?” Finn askes the question Rey could have never gotten out of her mouth, but wanted the answer to more than anything.

Solo huffed. “Don’t we all want to know that.” Slumping against the counter, spatula still in hand, his eyes no longer looked at the cramped kitchenette of the ship, but to somewhere beyond. There was a small but fond, and also sad, smile on his lips.

“his dream was to resurrect the Jedi order.”

Rey’s guts twisted and turned and she regretted eating anything.

“The first few years it looked promising, he gathered force-sensitives together, taught them. Guided them. But.” He stops, his eyes are seeing something from another time and Chewbacca has gone still as a statue. Rey feels an instinct in her take root, the desire to flee and save herself from the words that are just waiting on the other side of this silence.

“He was betrayed. One of his students fell to the dark side, destroyed it all. Luke felt responsible. At first, we thought that he wanted to be alone for a while. To have his space. Then he didn’t come back. Simply disappeared. I guess he went for a quest of personal penance or other such nonsense.”

“NO!” All three males turned to watch at Rey, who had shot up from her chair, and was leaning heavily against the table with her hands. There were cracks, like spider-webs, on the plastic under her fingers, and all around them everything that hadn’t been bolted down had moved an inch or two from their place. An inch or two away from Rey. A subtle explosion of force.

“It’s not. It can’t be- Luke. Luke is too good. It cannot be his fault- It-“

“Sit down kid.” Solo commanded, voice steady but Rey could feel the pulse of his fear in the force. Ashamed, she sat down. She was slipping, dancing towards the dark side with every emotional outburst.

“The thing that matters, is that Luke felt responsible. And now he is missing.”

“But…Doesn’t the galaxy…need him. He’s a hero. The greatest hero to ever live.” Finn adds his two starstruck cents in.  Rey silently disagrees. Luke is much more than that.

“Well.” Han answers. “Talk like that probably didn’t help.” 

“Excuse me.” Rey ends up saying and rushes out of the kitchen as fast as she can without looking suspicious. She needs to be alone, somewhere where she can throw up in peace. Luke has been betrayed by an apprentice who fell to the dark side and there is nothing that can be done about it.

 

She is found by Finn in the fresher, throwing up her breakfast. Her practical hairstyle, that is meant to last for weeks at a time without oiling and brushing, takes care of the hair problem, but it is still good to feel a pair of hands rubbing on her back as she dry-heaves.

“Not used to space-rations?”

She laughs, spitting the las of it from her mouth. “It’s not the food. Believe me, this was the nicest meal I’ve had in years.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She rinses her mouth with water, still enjoying the luxury of its taste on her tongue. Finn hands her a towel and they share a smile.

“You okay though?”

“Yes. I just…It has been a weird couple of days. It’s all finally catching up I guess.”

“Tell me about it. I barely slept last night.”

“Pretty new to the resistance then, are you?”

“Yeah I…um. You see the thing is- Yeah I’m new, pretty new.”

For the first time it dawns on Rey that Finn is hiding something, but that’s fine. They are all hiding something in this ship.

“Pretty wild that we have the map to Luke Skywalker thought. He’s just…I never really thought of him as a _real_ real person.”

“I don’t understand how anyone could ever betray him. Turn _against_ him. He’s…”

“Yeah. I know.” Finn agrees and slaps Rey on the back. “Wanna try that breakfast thing again?”

“Sure.” She agrees with a half-smile, her thoughts twisting in her head. She wants to reprimand Finn that he knows absolutely nothing of Luke Skywalker. But another thought that slithers around her head is whether there really is that much difference between their understanding of Luke Skywalker. What does she know of her own son anyway? Nothing.

After breakfast, that she manages to keep down, Solo invites her to tinker on the ship. Buried waist deep inside the floor, Finn keeps passing them tools and Chewbacca keeps up a helpful commentary of a back-seat engineer. They snipe and bicker and have a tremendous amount of fun. Rey has to surrender the fact that she enjoys the company of Han Solo.

 

Enjoying the deep breath of fresh air on a planet filled with greenery, she almost laments the fact that she must return to Jakku and its cruel desert winds.

“You know…You know your way around a ship, I’ll give you that.”

Standing next to her, Han Solo looks almost fidgety. She crunches her brow in confusion.

“I’m just saying…It was actually Chewie’s idea, he likes you. But we could use a third crewmember.”

“Are you offering me a job?” She blurts out incredulous, not sure she heard right.

Solo immediately coughs self-consciously and shuffled some more.

“It won’t be easy. Or nice. I won’t be nice to you but-“

“You are offering me a job.” For a moment she imagines being just Rey, a young girl abandoned in Jakku; a scavenger with no sins to haunt her, no terrible weight of the galaxy, no penance. That Rey would jump for the change, could fly away to have adventures with Han Solo and go wherever she pleased.

Anakin Skywalker can’t do that.

“Thank you. I’m flattered but no. I have to return to Jakku.”

“To- To Jakku!? Who voluntary returns to Jakku??”

“I do.” She simply stated and gave Solo no change to talk her around. She started the trek towards the fortress/bar that they were headed to and strode with enough purpose to keep Solo from commenting further.

 

“I have lived long enough to see the same eyes on different people.”

“Maz.” Solo rolls his eyes at the small woman who has her eyes on frozen Rey. “Spare us the mystic routine, they just need an untraceable ship.”

The small woman whips her head towards Han, releasing Rey from the stare that had seen too much.

“They, Solo? If there is someone who needs to return to the resistance, it is you.”

“Maz, c’mon. Leia doesn’t want to see me.”

“Your _wife,_ needs you nevertheless.”

“Your WHAT!” Whatever uneasiness Maz’ sharp gaze had installed in Rey, it is all wiped away by the bombshell that the small woman had dropped over their heads. Or over her head. No one else had even blinked at the impossible word.

Leia. Strong, intelligent, brave, undefeated, untamed, perfect Leia. Leia, who deserved the galaxy and more had married _Han Solo_?!

 Rey did not care that the others were giving her weird looks. She was trying to fit together an idea in her head that refused to form. The idea of Leia Organa marrying Han Solo. Leia Organa. Princess, spy, rebel, warrior, _Padmé’s daughter._

“How can you know who he is and not who he is married to?” Finn broke the confused silence that had followed Rey’s outburst. He went ignored by the reborn chosen one who was too busy trying to recollect her mind that had just been blown.

“you sound personally offended by my marital life, kid. It’s getting a bit weird.” Solo scoffed and then felt his lizard brain freeze in terror as a nineteen-year-old girl gave him a scowl that his subconscious insisted was supposed to come with a black mask and rattling breath.

“Wait.” Said high-pitched young girl’s voice continued, and everybody at the table went perfectly still and silent. “If you and Leia are married...Then what exactly are you doing _smuggling Rathtars?”_

“Well…you see…It’s really none of your business.”

Finn had leaned as far back as his chair would allow, wanting to get away from Solo and Rey, who had stood up and was leaning over the table, her smile full of teeth getting more alarming the closer she leaned.

“You left Leia behind and went straight back to smuggling like the scum you are.”

While Han Solo was trying to convince himself that the shadow Rey’s small form was throwing on the wall in no way resembled certain long-dead Sith-lord, Maz was sporting a self-satisfied smile of someone who had just found out a secret that someone had been trying to desperately conceal.

“This…girl, is not entirely wrong, even if she is a bit passionate about the subject.” Maz’ calm voice interrupted the stare down. “Han. You need to go home. To Leia. You cannot run forever.”

“Leia doesn’t need me. She has the resistance to run. She is better off without me to drag her down.”

“Yes. You shouldn’t have married her in the first place.” 

A sharp slap to the table made Maz’ displeasure known. “Mind your words. Han is an old friend of mine, and you are a guest at my house.”

Rey, biting back what first jumped to her tongue, sat down.

“Han. This separation is not helping either of you. You think she doesn’t need you? You are the only one who can understand what she is going through.”

Han did not look at any of them and kept stubbornly quiet.

“The problem these days-“ Maz spared a shrewd look at all of them, “is that everyone keeps running away and then calling it a penance.”

“I’m not calling it a penance.” Solo grumbled.

Rey avoided Maz’ eyes, biting her cheek until she could taste blood.

“And what if there is nothing to do but to run.” Asked Finn. “What else can you do when faced with the First Order?”

“Some decide to fight back.” Maz answered easily.

“And some die!” Finn rubbed a hand over his eyes after his outburst. “You don’t know. Any of you. The first order it- It’s too big. Too powerful. You can’t fight against them and win, you can only run.”

“In that case, you might want to negotiate for a transportation to the outer rims, and stop pretending to be something you are not.” Maz answered just as easily.

There was a tense moment, as Rey just blinked, trying to catch up to the conversation that had taken entirely different turn than she had expected. Before she had time to put any of her halting questions to use, Finn had already left the table, an ashamed droop on his shoulders, but a determined stomp on his steps.

She still did not understand what had just happened, but she did understand that her new (only) friend was leaving, was turning his back on her, and she panicked. She panicked and rushed after him, gripping his shoulder in a vice-like grip and spinning him around, to explain himself.

“Finn what- But the resistance- Your mission-?”

Faced with Rey’s honest bafflement, Finn deflated like a balloon. “I’m not resistance. I never was.” He continued more frantically, words that have been on the tip of his tongue finally bursting out.

“I’m not a hero, I’m not who you thought me to be. I’m a stormtrooper. A runaway. I-“

Rey’s hands had dropped from his shoulders and had instead gripped his hands. This was a conversation that mattered, she could sense it, and Finn could sense it to. Emboldened by her silence and her eyes that were keen, giving him space to speak, he continued, telling her things that he had not meant to tell. The words just kept tumbling out.

“I was taken as a child, like all of us. Brainwashed and trained to do one thing and think only one thing.” The grip that Rey had on his hands tightened, bordering on painful. “But I couldn’t. My first battle, and I froze. I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t kill anyone. I made a choice, that I wouldn’t do it. That I would run. And I did. Maybe I’m just a coward, but I will not go back, and I will not have anything to do with the First Order anymore. So I ran, straight into you and you looked at me like no one ever had, like I was a person! And I didn’t want you to change that look, so I lied. Because I was ashamed. And a coward.”

“You’re not a coward.” Rey whispered with trembling voice. “You’re not. You are braver than I ever was.”

“Well, that’s not true-“ Finn started to say something bashful and misguided, but Rey cut him off immediately.

“You refused to be a weapon. You refused to have a master. You are a --------. And that is everything.”

“A what now? What language is that-“

“May the suns watch over you, Finn.” Rey tiptoed to kiss his forehead.

“Wait.” Finn was starting to realise that this conversation was shaping to be a farewell. “Come with me Rey. We could go together. Have a life. Disappear to the outer rims, far away from the First Order and the Resistance and all of it!”

“No Finn. I was always going to go back to Jakku. It is where I must be. And I don’t want to risk dragging you into anything.”

“Anything like what? What are you running from?”

Rey just shook her head. This was a secret she would not divulge, not even to Finn. Especially not Finn, who didn’t know enough to hate her. Who would start a life on the outer rims and remember her fondly.

“Please don’t ask again.”

“Why. What could-“

“Because you looked at me like a person, and I don’t want that to change.” Rey mirrored his own words back to him, a sad smile on her face.

“But…” The man hesitated a second, before pulling Rey into a quick but fierce hug. “Take care of yourself Rey.”

“Likewise. Finn.” She whispered into his ear, before they broke apart, and walked away from each other, both feeling terrible, lonely, and powerless to make any other decision.

 

She was going to return to Maz and Solo. She was going to ask where she could find a ship heading towards Jakku. She was even going to apologise to Solo and tell him to take BB8 to Leia. That she trusted that the greatest smuggler of the galaxy could easily do it.

She didn’t make it that far, as she ended up rooted in place, listening to the faint screams hauntingly calling for her from the darkness of the staircase leading down.

Screams of children _younglings_ in pain _being slaughtered_.

She didn’t want to go down. She couldn’t move away.

The force pulled and rippled, its intention clear.

She went down.

 

Walking beneath the cold stone ceiling, she knew exactly how stories like these ended. What happens to those who descend into the recess, pulled in by ghosts of the past. She also knew that there was no way of avoiding it, not when the distant screams still echoed in the force.

She knew that in the chest was a past she did not want to see. Nestled innocently amongst other junk was the sabre. Sabre that had cut down the republic and the empire.

And. Then. She. He. Was. In-

 

_In the cloud city, Vader’s suit a crushing weight and breathing is impossible- The world is collapsing all around, somewhere Luke is screaming and losing his hand, Mistakes. Empire. Chains. It all burying you alive, the walls come down-_

_In an unfamiliar field- In Coruscant-, where a temple is burning- A jedi temple- burning while the ground is littered with bodies of younglings- It is like a double-layered holo, the jedi temples burning, the children, a man kneeling on the floor- ground- in despair, his apprentice has-_

_-A red lightsabre- a man in mask- a boy in a mask-_

_In a desert, I didn’t come here to free the slaves- No mother stay with me- where did you come from girl-_

_In a forest covered in snow, staring at a scared boy holding a red lightsabre, the world crumbling into small pieces-_

_Obi-Wan’s surprised voice: Rey?_

Maz finds her laying on the cold stone floor, staring at the ceiling, a blank look on her face.

“I knew you would find it.”

Rey answers with a huttian curse. She has no doubt that the old woman understood perfectly the meaning of the words but is entirely unphased by the colourful expression.

 “Why do you have it?” Rey rolls to her side but makes no move to get up. “Why is my son’s lightsabre tucked away in some bar in Sith-kriff nowhere?”

“It was your lightsabre before him.”

“Did he run out of money to pay his tab and had to pawn his sabre?”

“You have been hiding away for long enough. Get up and take control of your own life!”

She rolled back to stare at the ceiling. “You have no idea what you are talking about.”

There was a steel in the voice of the small proprietor, steel that made it known that this woman was not afraid of the shadows that this small nineteen-year-old body was capable of throwing on the walls, as she said:

“I know exactly what I am talking about Skywalker. Your presence is like a sun and void at once, and here you are, wallowing in self-pity in my cellar.”

“What more can the galaxy want from me. Hasn’t it taken enough. How many times do I have to be consumed by destiny before the galaxy is satisfied?”

“Until you do what you were sent here to do, I would guess.”

“Well, I will have no part in it. Not this time.”

“Rey.” Maz’ voice took a gentler note. “Do you not see the gift you have been given. A new life. A new change. A new beginning. Rey. _Rey_ , not Anakin. Do not let your fear consume and prevent you from trying to _live_ again.”

“For a Jedi there is only do, or do not. There is no try.”

“My dear Skywalker. There is only try for any of us.”

There was a long and loaded silence as Rey picked herself from the floor, cautiously took her old lightsabre in hand, felt the weight of it, and then passed it to Maz.

“No. I will not take it. Pass it to someone else. Throw it in the ocean. Or deep space. I don’t care.”

Then she strode away, only just keeping herself from running.

 

The forest was damp, full of voices and, packed with life, crawling, climbing, nesting, all over. It was the opposite of the desert she had gotten used to in Jakku, had almost forgotten the feel of. Feeling the cool bark of s tree against her forehead, she tried to gather her calm, to stop _feeling so much all the time._

There was no way she could take that lightsabre. There was no way that her taking up a weapon and starting to _fix_ the galaxy, would end up in anything but a tragedy, hadn’t they already seen it?

Something rippled in the force and looking up she could see something red crawling across the sky.

And then pain. Like billions of voices had screamed out in agony and then suddenly-

Oh Gods NO, not again-

The shock after her emotional turmoil is too much. She withdraws her senses, slams her shields up so fast, so hard, so hazardly, that she knocks herself right into unconsciousness.

 

Rey wakes up somewhere that is cool and dry, but most assuredly not the forest. She is laying on her back, against something smooth and metallic. As she muddles back to consciousness, she becomes aware of the restraints strapping her in place, and while her first reaction is a spike of panic, the clone wars taught her to be still and assess the situation before doing anything rash. After the situation had been assessed, she could be as rash as she wanted. The true Anakin Skywalker method.

Opening her eyes, she finds herself in a familiar room. An interrogation room, almost a perfect copy of the ones the empire had been littered with. There was a certain strangeness in seeing it without the red tint of the mask.

Sitting silently beside her is someone in a dark mask and an involuntarily giggle escapes her before she can help it. Isn’t there always someone in a dark mask overseeing these. Standing silently and threateningly in the corner. Secretly bored by the cruelty. A numb monster.

“You think this is funny.” Her interrogator grumbles with the garbled voice of a voice-box.

“Who the kriff are you?”

“Listen scavenger-“

“Where the kriff am I?”

“The BB8 unit you had-“

“What the kriff is going on!?”

“YOU!” her interrogator stands up and takes a step forwards to loom over her. “will give me the information I need!”

She blinks at the display meant to intimidate her. This interrogator is not a numb monster, not even an effective one. This man has already played his cards. Now Rey knows that he needs something form her, is desperate for information and is somehow trying to play all of his intimidation cards at once, the end result being not impressive but slightly unnerving anyway.

“Listen scavenger.” His helmet is suddenly inches from her face. “I can take anything I want, I will take everything I want, and there is nothing you can do.”

“How did I end up here?” Rey asks the mask, genuinely curious. The mask takes a step back, frustrated by the lurking fear that is slowly knocking on the edges of his senses. Here is a teenage girl, a scavenger from a backwards planet, unimportant, who is not at all afraid to be bound in a torture chamber of the First Order with Kylo Ren. She truly is stupid, he keeps telling himself.

“I found you. Abandoned by your…’friends’. Unconscious. Vulnerable. I could have killed you right then and there.”

“probably.”

A red lightsabre was ignited and brought to hover near her neck. “Do not mock me.”

“I wasn’t.” The girl’s eyes glinted a queer gold as the red sparks from the sabre reflected in the dark brown irises. “I was stating a fact. You probably could have killed me, as you said, I was unconscious.”

The sabre was drawn back and shut off. “You have been running with the resistance scum. With _Han Solo._ And they failed you, as they fail everyone. Did you think that you would find family in them? Did you think that you would find a father in Han Solo? Pathetic. He would have disappointed you.”

“Is this an interrogation, or are you just using this as an opportunity to open up about your personal issues?”

“Do you have any idea who you are antagonising?” The man hissed, pacing the floor in front of her.

“No. As far as I can see, I’m having a conversation with a subpar interrogator wearing a bucket in his head.”

The man stopped, and even strapped to the vertical table, Rey could see her new companion clench his fist violently around his lightsabre. Instead of a quick beheading, there was a moment of quiet and finally the lightsabre was strapped back to his belt and the helmet removed from his head.

The first thing that runs across Rey’s mind was _young_. The second was _familiar eyes_.

“you think you are so brave. You are not, you are nothing. Alone, powerless-“

“You have _her_ eyes.”

“What.”

“ _Her.”_ There was reverence in Rey’s tone. “ _Padmé_. I would know those eyes anywhere. In death, at the end of the world. In madness, in darkness, in oblivion, those eyes-“

“You are mad.” Breathed out Kylo Ren, finally not trying to sound intimidating, now simply baffled and unnerved. A position he was not used to outside of master Snoke’s presence. As was his habit, he transformed his uncertainty into anger, into violence. Extending his hand, he pushed forwards with the force, aiming to slam into the girl’s mind quickly and brutally, to gather the information he needed and get rid of her unnerving presence.

He got nowhere. Not even close. He slammed straight into a wall so solid his attack did not even make a ripple against it.

“Don’t do that again.”

Enraged by the words, and the impossibility of the situation, Kylo Ren struck again, harder, and got similarly disappointing results.

“No, don’t. You can’t go into my mind.”

“I will break you, I will get what I came here for-“

“No, you don’t understand. I’m protecting _you. You don’t want to see what is inside there!”_ The words were followed by a violent shove against Kylo Ren’s mind, that was meant to simply make it clear that he should stay out of hers but was overestimated and slipped straight past the boy’s own shields and into his mind.

In there, anger, pain, conflict, fear, more anger, desperation, pride, more anger, -

“You left your _mother_ , to follow in the footsteps of _Darth Vader_!?”

The walls of the room were gently shaking, the metal groaning and grinding, and in the haze of pain that the unexpected mental demolition had caused, Kylo Ren felt afraid.

The bindings that had been secured around the girl snapped apart and fell to the floor like simple rubber bands.

Gathering himself quickly, (he was used to pain, to handling pain) Kylo stood back up and looked at the girl with new eyes. Mad? Yes, most certainly. But also strong, stronger than any of them could have expected. An unpolished diamond with oceans of raw force at her command. This was…He didn’t know what to feel.

“Vader…? Why for the suns would you- Are you mad?!”

Her grandson (Grandson!!) looked at her like _she_ was the mad one.

“You know nothing of me. Of Vader. This strength is mine, I have a right, the right of a bloodline-“

“A right.” Rey hysterically laughed. “A bloodline right of a slave to become a slave!”

“You DARE!-“ The force twisted and whipped. “-MOCK my grandfather!” A wall of force slammed into Rey and threw her into the wall like a rag-doll. Sliding down, she could see the hems of Ren’s dark robes snapping at his heels as he hurried out of the room, the door slamming behind him.

 

Sitting against the cool wall, Rey stared at the door, gently sensing the presence of several guards stationed outside the door. More guards than a lonely girl would have warranted, but less than was needed to subjugate Anakin/Vader/Rey. 

Staring at the door, she contemplated on what to do. Her grandson was here, heart drowned in darkness, in pain. Because of Vader. Ben Organa needed help, clearly, to be brought back to light. But…He had left. She had seen it in his mind. His hatred towards his father, his _mother_. All that pain and he had chosen _chains over family_.

Rey didn’t know how to help him. Everything about Ben Organa was too alien, too removed from the simple truths that defined Anakin/Vader/Rey that she had no idea where to even begin to approach her lost grandson.

Well, not certainly by moping in this room, said a voice that almost sounded like Obi-Wan in her head.

That is true. Rey agreed and got up. It was time to find Ben and talk some sense into him.

Taking a deep breath, she stood near the door and grasped the force, eyes flickering gold.

On the other side of the door a stormtrooper suddenly found breathing to be impossible. At first, there was an attempt to ignore it. At first it was only one soldier gasping for air. Then it was another, and another, and soon air had become a luxury-item for the soldiers stationed at the door.

One man suffocating is a tragic loss and something that the soldiers of First Order were conditioned to ignore. Everyone feeling the invisible noose on their necks was a looming threat, that made it known that no bravery would prevail, and a cause enough to abandon your post and scramble and crawl away.

Five of the troopers were left behind, to lay motionless on the floor in the great escape.

The door groaned and grinded, and finally the hinges snapped apart. This was a room made for interrogations, not for hosting prisoners, and the architect of the room had never even dreamed of creating doors to withstand force-users.

Stepping on the hallway, cautiously peering if she could see a weapon aimed at her way, Rey creeped out. A quick sweep with the force made sure that the troopers on the floor were unconscious, not dead. She felt herself pulled back from the edge of a gaping void, as she confirmed this

From there on, it was a game of hide and seek with an entire military base. It was familiar to Rey, scavenger used to dangling from empire’s rotting war-machines, and it was familiar to Anakin Skywalker of the clone wars, used to missions of subterfuge.  It was very unfamiliar to Vader, who had stalked halls very much like these with presence meant to be noticed and feared.

 

Dropping from the vents, she found herself in a room kept dark on purpose, as opposed to otherwise well-lit halls of the base, and with exactly one decoration dominating the centre of the floor.

She didn’t have time for this.

She couldn’t afford to draw attention to herself by making unnecessary sounds.

There was no practical reason why she should drop into the room instead of continuing on.

She dropped into the room, took a running start, and kicked the half-melted Vader helmet straight to the wall, were it cracked and shattered into satisfying tiny pieces.

It felt good. It felt like the best thing she had done in years. She felt like this one glorious moment would be worth any pain the First Order might put her through for it.

 

Creeping inside the walls of the humongous structure, bottomless pit beneath her and hostile army over her, Rey heard another pair of creeping footsteps. Staying perfectly still, she strained her senses, not believing what she was hearing.

But her senses were not tricking her, it was the low grumbling of a wookie, accompanied by two (assumedly) humans whispering. While in a galaxy this large, it could have been possible that they were not who she instantly thought first, crawling to peer over the edge of the walkway, she could see three pairs of boggled eyes staring back at her.

Crawling up, she stared back, and was the swept into a hug by Finn.

“Wha- How- Why are you here?” She blubbered, looking at Han Solo and Chewbacca and not understanding anything happening right then.

“We came for you, dummy.” Finn whispered in her ear.

“Me?”

“He tried to chase down a spaceship by foot when he saw Ren taking you into his ship.” Chewbacca elaborated in a low grumble. “He insisted that we come here to rescue you.”

Rey’s guts did a complicated flip. This man, Finn, who had known her for less than a week had come to the belly of the beast for her, after his own freedom had just been secured. As the realisation of the full weight of Finn’s actions dawned on her, she threw her own arms around Finn too, relishing on the solid weight and the steady feel of being cared for.

“escape first, hug later!” came the grumpy hiss from Solo, whose presence was still a baffling mystery to Rey. Hurrying after the wookie and the smuggler, Rey brushed on the man’s tattered jacket.

“Why are you here? How are you here?”

“Kid, we couldn’t just leave you for the First Order.”

“yes, you could have. You should have.”

“It’s not the desert everywhere kid.”

Han Solo had real warmth in his eyes as he glanced at Rey jogging besides him. She had to acknowledge that maybe Leia had had her reasons for marrying a man who could look at unimportant scavengers like that and come to their rescue in the middle of a hostile military base.

“Also, we are on a mission for the resistance.”

“How can I help?”

Both Solo and Chewbacca gave her looks, that she couldn’t fully decipher, and didn’t really care to. Her attention was on Finn again. “What is your objective? What do we need to do next?” Slipping back to the persona of the Hero with no Fear, Rey looked at all three in the eyes, and made it known that she was ready to assist them in anything.

“Just who are you, kid?” Solo muttered, probably to himself, but Rey addressed it anyway.

“We don’t have time for that. Just, let us assume that I’m more powerful than you think”

“How did you escape Kylo Ren anyway?” Finn added, the queer mood that had taken over the small assembly affecting him too.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“You used the force.” Solo said, but from the look on his eyes it was clear that even he knew that that was not all. “but it is not the only secret you are hiding.”

Rey almost opened her mouth to let the truth stumble out, but Solo’s raised hand stopped her.

“Not now. We don’t have time. We will talk about this later. But now we need to plant these explosives.”

“Yes.” Agreed Rey, who was always a big fan of explosives. Then, realising just who she was talking to, not only to Han Solo the smuggler, but to Han Solo the consort of Leia Organa and father of Ben Organa, she grabbed his elbow in a steely grip. “Ben. Ben is here, we need to bring him back too. Back to light. Back to Leia.”

Pain that looked much too familiar filled Solo’s eyes, and a silent understanding passed between them.

 

If there was something Anakin/Vader/Rey all believed in, it was family. Anakin Skywalker had created an empire for his family. Darth Vader had destroyed an empire for his family. Rey would have been willing to do either, had she been in the situation. She liked to tell herself that she wouldn’t create another empire, but the truth was that if either of the twins had asked, she would have tried.

Therefore, seeing Han Solo approach his lost son on the narrow walk-way filled her heart with nothing but joy for the steady knowledge that it would all end well. There was no possibility, no universe where someone would refuse to embrace their family, would refuse to be free of the chains of the dark side. For Vader there had been no choice. His son had come for him, and the only thing to do was to choose him.

Ben Organa approached his father with familiar pain on his face, which had once ripped at Vader as he had finally seen a way to escape his slavery, had finally found something worth feeling anything at all.

The force sang with Rey’s joy, at the knowledge that Leia wouldn’t have to suffer anymore, that her family would be brought back together again.

At first, she didn’t understand what she was seeing from the ledge up high above the father and son. She saw the flash of red, heard the pained howl of Chewbacca, saw a body fall down, -what-?

As her brain caught up with her eyes, it still did not bring understanding. A red lightsabre, Chewbacca aiming at the boy with his weapon, Han Solo no longer-

The truth fell on her like a black hole, like a dying star.

The truth made no sense.

The truth did not fit into the undeniable truths that were written in her soul, in her bones, into the deep part of her that had stayed the same through Anakin and Vader and now Rey.

The truth was cruel.

 

She had to be lead away by Finn who grabbed her hand and guided her through the explosion and through the blaster-fire. If Finn had not kept pulling her, she would have stayed there, standing like a still statue.

She felt calm, unreal. She could feel the dark side gathering to rest on her shoulders like a warm blanker, but there was not enough rage to use it, not enough anything to use it. For now, there was only perfect serenity that the jedi council of the old would have been glad to see. Distantly she knew that this would not last. That this was the sea receding before the tsunami.

Like someone waking up from a dream, she realised that she was in a snowy forest, that Finn’s hand was slippery with sweat against her own even in the cold and that pain was slowly creeping into her extremities. Soon it would get further, until there would be nothing left.

In front of them stood Kylo Ren, red lightsabre ignited in one hand, the other cradling his bloodied side and a mad glint in his eyes.

“There is no one left to save you now!”

No you fool, now there is no one left to save _you,_ thought Rey.

“Why did you do it?” She asked instead, the last crumbles of her calmness put into that one question.

“You will all die. Traitors, enemies-ALL!”

“You can try.” She says flatly. Besides her Finn, the braveheart, has ignited her old lightsabre. Seeing the familiar blue blade distracts Rey momentarily.

“Where did you get that?”

“Maz gave it to me.” Finn answers, his eyes never leaving the dark figure of Kylo Ren in front of them, his grip all wrong but his eyes determined.

Seeing the traitorous stormtrooper holding the lightsabre of his grandfather makes the dark side twist and howl even stronger around Kylo Ren, and his eyes flash pure sith gold as he howls in rage.

A wave of force slams towards them, a manifestation of Kylo Ren’s mental distress, as he goes for the primal instinct of slamming his enemies away with the chaotic dark force howling around him. If Rey hadn’t been distracted by the surprising appearance of her old sabre, she might have been able to shield both herself and Finn, but as it is, she is not in the mental state to be sharp. The force shields only her and only after she has been thrown back few feet.

Rey rolls nimbly in the snow and stays in a crouch to assess the situation. Finn has not been as lucky, as he has been thrown brutally against one of the trees, and lays now unconscious in the snow, the lightsabre sticking from the snowbank near him.

Kylo Ren extends his hand, ready to claim his birthright in his hand. Rey extends hers, ready to accept her responsibility.

The sabre soars through the air, and lands in the hand of its first owner.

Equally perplexed and enraged Kylo Ren looks at the unworthy desert scavenger, with no bloodright nor importance for the galaxy, holding Darth Vader’s old sabre as it belongs in her hand and lunges; his own red sabre cutting through air in strikes that are more force than finesse.

Rey dodges all of them with ease, dancing around the attacks like she had never done anything else expect practice lightsabre duels.  

The duel does not take long. Kylo Ren is injured, both physically and mentally, running entirely on fumes, and has never had an equal force sensitive opponent to practice duelling with. Luke Skywalker had taught them meditation and gardening and told them all that the new age would not need force-enhanced warriors but healers. Cutting up his students had been easy.

Cutting up this girl was not easy. Seemed to be impossible actually.

“You are strong in the force. You could join-“

Seemingly growing tired of dancing around his blows, she executes a fast, twisting movement with her sabre that sends Kylo’s own red sabre flying and cuts and angry cauterized wound across his face.

She stands over him, looking at this wretched boy bleeding in the snow at her feet, and all she can see are Padmé’s eyes staring up at her, Padmé’s eyes full of pain and fear. They root her on her place, and there is a sense of relief in her as the ground breaks in half between them, taking away her choice in this matter.

So, she leaves Padmé’s pained eyes on the face of a murderer behind her and hurries to gather Finn, to follow Chewbacca’s distant howls as he drives in on Millennium Falcon to save them all.

 

The journey through space is spent in haze as Rey’s entire attention is focused on Finn, who keeps dropping in and out of consciousness too often for Rey’s liking. Her heart beating against her ribcage, she tries to stay optimistic and ignore the terrible statistics of people she has loved and their mortality rate.

It was only when they reached the resistance, where Finn was flocked by medics and rolled away on a stretcher, that Rey felt the grip loosen around her chest. It was okay, he was with the professionals now.

And now that there was no longer fear keeping her upright, there was only exhaustion, bone-deep, all-consuming exhaustion.

 

“Rey? I presume?”

She knows that voice. She knew that voice. All those years hearing that voice, younger of course, but still the same and not once had Vader known what gift it was to hear that voice.

Now she knew better, and whipped around to face Leia Organa, whose eyes were sad but kind and who was smiling.

Rey took this memory and safely preserved it in the deepest lockers of her mind.

“I’ve heard so much about you.” She continues, genuinely happy to meet Rey, her sorrow locked deep in her heart where it cannot hurt others. Rey cannot feel anything but unworthy as Leia’s arms come to hug her in fierce embrace.

“Leia- Oh Leia, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry about everything-“

“It wasn’t your fault child. Han always made his own choices.”

And the worst thing is how tempting it is to take this forgiveness from Leia, to pretend that there is no Anakin and no Vader, only a teenage girl meeting a legendary general.

But she couldn’t be that selfish, not after everything Leia had gone through. She deserved the truth.

“That’s not- Leia I’m not who you think I am.”

“You’re not Rey?”

“No I- I am Rey. But not only Rey. It’s-.” She glanced at the hustle and bustle of the area. “Is there somewhere private we can talk?”

A curious gleam has settled on Leia’s bright eyes and she nods. “Follow me.”

 

 

“So, after everything the galaxy has taken from me, my parents, my planet, my son my husband. And then it decides to spit back _you_.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t.” Her voice is sharp. Then it goes softer, more dangerous than when it was sharp. “And where were you. Where were you when my son started to worship your memory and you would have for ONCE BEEN USEFULL??!!”

Rey couldn’t face her, but couldn’t also not face her, so she kept the eye contact, accepting the hatred.

“I was in Jakku.”

“In Jakku.”

“I thought that it would be my penance. An exile without touching anything in the galaxy anymore. Leaving you and your brother alone.”

Leia laughs a bitter laugh, and it seems that her anger has run its course. She has no more energy for anger.

“Well, now I know where Luke gets it from.” She stands up and faces Rey with all the dignity of the last Princess of Alderaan. “If you want to help, find him. Find Luke. I think that if there is anyone who can bring him back, it will be you. Maybe this is what the force willed.” She adds the last part under her breath.

“I will.” Vows Rey. “I will bring your brother back.”

“May the force be with you.” Leia says, and it cannot be said whether she is being sarcastic or not, but Rey doesn’t care. She only cares that her path forwards is now clear to her. Her meaning in this new life finally revealed. As Maz had said, it was time to start cleaning up her old messes.

 


End file.
